Red Beard
by Jlocked
Summary: Summary: When Sherlock wakes up, he is in for a nasty surprise. It turns out that he has been in stasis for longer than the planned 18 months. A lot longer. The scientific vessel Red Beard is adrift in deep space and he is all alone. More or less... Another one with The Lady of Purpletown. We had so much fun doing this one for Miniseries March
1. The End

The research ship Red Beard was vast. Not vast like a galaxy or even a star system, of course. But pretty damn big. Picture an average 20th century metropolis, cut it into roughly 100 pieces and stick those on top of each other. Wrap it all in a metre thick shell of hardened steel. And then paint the whole thing red.

It was also completely silent.

If you went down to the lower decks and put your ear to the walls surrounding the giant propulsion core, you might be able to detect a subtle hum. If you held your breath. Maybe.

And in one corridor on deck 42, a door was malfunctioning and would slide open or closed every half hour or so with a small woosh.

But there were no human sounds on the ship. And there hadn't been for a very, very long time.

Until today.

Sherlock opened his eyes slowly. After a moment's hesitation, he reached out and gave the door to the stasis chamber an experimental push. There was a sharp hiss followed by a sound not unlike a sigh. The door swung open and Sherlock stepped out, reaching up to ruffle his hair before heading down the empty corridor.

"Ah, Sherlock," Mycroft's voice sounded. "I trust you enjoyed your prolonged beauty sleep."

Sherlock spun around, but there was no one there. He smiled and sighed. "Ah, brother dear. Spying on me as usual? Or couldn't you be bothered to come down here and greet me yourself?"

"It is not a question of being _bothered_ ," Mycroft answered. "Look around and make a deduction."

Reluctantly, Sherlock did as his brother asked. " _Nobody_ is here to greet me. That's hardly standard protocol. So something must be going on, keeping everybody busy." He shrugged and set off, heading for the messroom. "Another celebration? Did someone make a breakthrough? Or did you perhaps get another promotion? What did they make you this time? God Almighty?"

Mycroft let out a long sigh. "I suppose you could say I have been promoted. Though not to God. And there has been no celebration."

"I'm not surprised. I doubt there is anyone left on this ship still capable of feeling anything but faint annoyance at your… 'glorious career'..." Sherlock stopped in the door to the mess and looked around. It was completely empty. But not empty like in the morning when the cleaning system had put everything neatly ready for the first early risers. This was a cluttered kind of empty. Chairs were left scattered throughout the room, quite a few of them tipped over. Trays, plates and cups were still on the tables or, in a few cases, under them. All in all, it looked like the room had been left in a hurry in the middle of dinner.

Except for one odd detail: there was not a single scrap of food to be seen.

Sherlock studied the room, his pale eyes seeming to take in every single detail. He frowned.

"Everybody's dead," he said slowly.

"I knew you'd get there eventually," Mycroft said. "Though it seems that suspended animation has made you even slower than you already were. Or perhaps my memory failed me…"

Sherlock scoffed and strode across the room, pausing to examine various things more closely, before reaching the terminal by the far wall. He tapped a few buttons, then stepped back, wrinkling his nose in disgust as his brother's seemingly disembodied head appeared on the screen.

"I have suspended your access to the log," the head said, raising an eyebrow at Sherlock. "I feel that the mental exercise will do you some good. Everybody's dead. Would you care to elaborate?"

"There are no bodies," Sherlock said. "So although violence happened here, they died somewhere else."

"Or?" Mycroft prompted.

"Or…" Sherlock shot the screen a filthy look. "Or they died here and the bodies were removed. But that seems unlikely since there are no traces of the bodies at all. The room could, of course, have been cleaned afterwards, but then why not put it back in order as well? Why remove the bodies but leave all the other evidence? That does not make sense. So…" He spun around, giving the room another glance. "It was a senseless act. It was not planned violence and the bodies were not moved, they were… dissolved… destroyed… They were…" His eyes widened. "Oh… They were eaten!"

"Very good," Mycroft said. "You will have to imagine my applause, as I am not currently capable of using my hands. Now you already know the next question: what kind of creatures would eat both the crew's dead bodies and their food?"

"Scavengers," Sherlock said immediately. "Carrion eaters. Since none are known in this sector, I suppose Red Beard either came across a new species or ran into a migrating group."

"We didn't exactly come across them," Mycroft said.

Sherlock turned to the screen again, this time with an accusatory stare. "Are you saying that someone on the ship _made_ whatever did this? That it was an experiment that got out of hand?"

"It could explain all the facts," Mycroft answered.

"So could the log," Sherlock snapped. "Why won't you let me see it?"

"Because there is something, or rather someone, I need you to see first."

Sherlock frowned. "So there are survivors? Other than us?"

"Us?" Mycroft repeated, raising an eyebrow.

Just as Sherlock opened his mouth to reply, an abrupt clattering sounded from the corridor. "Who's there?" he called, darting across the mess hall and through the door. There he stopped abruptly, staring at the shorter, blond man who was beaming up at him.

"Hello!" the man said brightly, thrusting his right hand at Sherlock to shake, while the left still rested on a metal cane. "I'm John. So great to meet you."

Sherlock studied the man. He was not in uniform but in civilian clothes with sturdy blue trousers and a woollen jumper. "Who are you?" he snapped. "You do not belong on this ship."

John's smile fell a little. "Oh?" he said, sounding rather sad. "But… I live here."

"You live here?" Sherlock shook his head. "How can you live here? Where did you come from?"

John shrugged. "I was in the officers' lounge just now. Sorry to have startled you, by the way. I'd dropped my stick." He held the cane up for Sherlock, looking rather proud.

"Your stick?" Sherlock took a step back. "What is going on here? You're not making any sense… Mycroft!" He looked over his shoulder as if expecting his brother to be lurking somewhere behind him. "Is this some kind of joke?"

Mycroft's head appeared on the nearest screen and he snorted. "Sherlock, you're a scientist. Shouldn't you at least _notice_ when you encounter a completely new species?"

"What?" Sherlock stared at his brother, then turned to look at the small man again.

John cocked his head, eyes wide and questioning.

"Oh…" Sherlock gasped, his eyes widening. "You're a dog. But how can you be? Humanimal hybrids are illegal. And notoriously difficult to breed." He raised his hand as if to touch John but stopped himself. "Who made you?" he asked, accusingly.

John just tilted his head further, but Mycroft answered: "He evolved."

"Evolved?" Sherlock spat. "That's not possible. That would take thousands… millions of years…"

"Well, it _has_ been three millennia," Mycroft said. "And he had a little help along the way…"

"It's been what?" Sherlock almost screamed, whirling around to face the screen again.

Mycroft raised his eyebrows. "You _still_ hadn't realised?"

"It was supposed to be 18 months… Just until we returned to Earth. It was a minor transgression... " He stomped his foot hard, causing John to jump back in surprise, letting out a startled little yelp.

Sherlock ignored him and continued. "They can't just change my sentence. Not without waking me up. And besides… Why keep me on the ship? If I was to remain in prolonged stasis for… for millennia… I should have been transferred to a terrestrial facility."

"It wasn't planned," Mycroft said, looking slightly pained by the admission. "I had to keep you in there for your own safety."

"My own safety?" Sherlock seemed to calm down almost instantly. "Of course. Some kind of attack or accident. Killing the entire crew. But that wouldn't necessitate me being kept dormant for this long. So you were waiting for something to dissipate. Radiation…? No… a disease." He looked over at John. "And he must be the descendant of something from one of the labs…" Then he turned to the screen again. "But how did you survive, brother?"

Mycroft looked at him for a long moment before he said: "I didn't."

"Oh…" This time it wasn't a triumphant cry, but rather a soft breath of realisation. "So you're… in the computer now?"

"It would be more accurate to say that I _am_ the computer," Mycroft said. "I took precautions before my death, making it possible to upload my memories and consciousness into the system."

John cautiously stepped closer to Sherlock. "Are you okay?"

Sherlock's eyes had gone strangely empty, but he blinked a few times and then focused on John. "Yes…" he said, doing a sort of small dismissive wave with his hand as he turned and made his way back to the mess, sinking down on the first available chair. "I'm… I'm fine."

John followed and stood behind him, then almost made Sherlock jump as he rested his chin on his shoulder. Sherlock seemed conflicted for a moment, then raised his hand and patted John's hair lightly. "No, really," he said, forcing a smile. "I'm fine. I mean… I'm slightly disappointed that not even death could get my brother off my back, but… I suppose it's marginally better than being all alone on the ship."

"Oh, but you're not alone," a high voice rang out behind them. Sherlock almost knocked John over as he jumped to his feet and turned around.

"You!" he cried. "Why aren't you dead?"

"Oh, but I am, dear," the man said, sauntering towards them. He raised a hand and pointed to the metallic H on his forehead. "I'm a hologram, see? Did you think I'd abandon you for something as petty as a slight case of death?"

John glared at the hologram, growling and baring his teeth. "Who is he?"

"Moriarty," Sherlock said, not taking his eyes off the man. "My… colleague."

"Oh, come on, Sherlock. How many times have I told you to call me Jim?" he pouted. "And surely we were more than colleagues. We were…" He seemed to consider the word, almost tasting it. "Partners!"

"We worked in the same lab," Sherlock spat. "By necessity. Not by choice!"

Jim let out an exaggerated gasp and put a hand over his heart. "Sherlock!" he exclaimed, failing to sound hurt. "How can you say such things? Such cruel things?" Then he broke down laughing.

"As we can only sustain one hologram at a time, I selected Professor Moriarty as the most intelligent crew member," Mycroft declared. "Not only because I know how easily you get bored, little brother, but also because he may assist you in your journey back to Earth."

"You mean you selected the one person on this ship capable of getting more on my nerves than you?" Sherlock spat, glaring at the image on the screen. "Thank you, brother dear."

"I suppose the course of several thousand years made me forget how ungrateful you can be," Mycroft answered. "Should you not let your judgement be clouded by sentiment, you would see the merit of my decision."

" _I_ don't like him," John claimed, crossing his arms.

"Liking him is entirely irrelevant," Mycroft pointed out. "Intelligence will be of more use than a delightful personality."

"I don't need him." Sherlock almost crossed his arms too, but changed his mind. Instead he got up and began pacing, not looking at any of the others. "I don't need his assistance. Assistance for what? I'm not a pilot. The ship is perfectly capable of flying itself. Unless…" He paused. "Unless there's still something left of the disease that killed the crew, but then… Then you would have kept me in stasis…" He glared at Mycroft. "What aren't you telling me? What's wrong?"

"Oh, poor Sherlock," Jim teased, still laughing. "Stasis must have had a detrimental effect on your intellect. You're not usually _this_ slow. When the outbreak occurred, reports were automatically sent back to Earth. The ship's emergency protocol took over and set us on a course for an unpopulated quadrant of the galaxy. Now that the ship is finally completely decontaminated, Red Beard can return home, but…" He made a dramatic pause, looking around at the others, but when neither looked impressed, he sighed and continued. "Since we have been travelling at 70% maximum speed for…" He pretended to check a non-existing watch on his wrist. "... 2901 years, unless we figure out how to make Red Beard move faster, you will be 2064 years old, give or take, by the time we return."

John blinked. "Do humans get that old?"

"No," Sherlock answered, frowning at his brother. "I would have to go into stasis… Again…"

"Yet according to my calculations, it should indeed be possible to make the ship accelerate," Mycroft said. "With Professor Moriarty to fill in the gaps in my theory and your helping hands, Sherlock, it should not take more than a couple of years to return to Earth."

"So you'll only be half a relic when we return to Earth," Jim said, delighted. "I wonder if your worth as an antique will make up for your utter uselessness as a scientist in a world that left you behind aeons ago."

"Drop dead!" Sherlock retorted. "Oh wait… No… You already did that, didn't you?"

John barked out a laugh.

For the first time since he had appeared, Moriarty's smile faltered. "At least," he said, his voice now ice cold, "I'm not a convicted criminal."

"Wait, what?" John said, looking between Moriarty and Sherlock. " _This_ guy, a criminal? Have you met him?"

"I was innocent," Sherlock huffed.

Mycroft frowned. "You were _caught_ coming out of Corporal Wilkes' office."

"With proof that he had been siphoning off funds to his own foundation to back up some of his more… questionable research." This time Sherlock did cross his arms, looking rather defensive. "And I would have brought him down, only Sergeant Anderson managed to compromise the evidence before I could present it to the captain."

"Stupid Anderson," John said, scowling.

"So instead you decided to insult the captain, his entire family and the continent of South America." Mycroft rolled his eyes.

"He deserved it. The others were just a bonus." Sherlock couldn't hold back a small smile at the memory.

 _Captain Carmichael, a tall man with whiskers, took a few steps towards Sherlock, his face scrunched up in anger._

" _Captain," Mycroft said, reminding the man that he was also still in the office._

 _Carmichael stopped, but pointed a finger at Sherlock and turned his head towards Mycroft. "If he thinks I will tolerate this kind of subordination… I could have him sent off the ship. In fact I will! You heard what he said, we can charge him for mutiny and it's not like the crew will miss him…"_

" _However," Mycroft said, "once we return to Earth, the Board will wonder about the sudden disappearance of our most renowned scientist. Therefore I suggest a milder sentence."_

 _Carmichael huffed, sending Sherlock a contemptuous look. The scientist, however, seemed unconcerned with the discussion._

" _If he says three words, they'll understand my choice well enough."_

" _But, again, you will need him alive and on board of this ship in order to let them hear those three words," Mycroft argued._

" _Got a point there," Carmichael grumbled. "But I won't let this go unpunished! It sets a bad example and he's crossed the line many times now. What's the worst we can do without kicking him off?"_

 _Mycroft hesitated for a moment, his eyes on Sherlock. "Suspended animation," he said finally. "Combining the charges of breaking and entering with insulting a superior officer, I would say six months."_

" _Six months?" Carmichael repeated, outraged. "That's not nearly enough. Six years, that's more like it!"_

" _Come, come." Mycroft got up from his chair and walked over to the captain. "Let us not exaggerate. It is, after all, a minor offence."_

 _Carmichael inhaled sharply, lips pressed together. "Minor, indeed. One would think you're very keen to let your brother off lightly, Counsellor."_

" _Don't be absurd," Mycroft said. "I am not given to outbursts of brotherly compassion."_

" _Anyway," Carmichael said haughtily, "he's going into stasis until we're back on Earth and not a day less than that."_

 _Mycroft nodded slowly. "Thank you, Captain. Sherlock… Go pack your things."_

 _Sherlock, who had been watching the exchange dispassionately, got to his feet. "You do realise what this will mean to the Reichenbach project? Without me in the lab, the people of planet Reichenbach will have to go without vaccines for another couple of centuries."_

" _We'll put other people on it," Carmichael said coldly. "Now get out!"_

 _Sherlock opened his mouth, ready to reply, but Mycroft cut him off. "Now, Sherlock." He opened the office door and gestured for Sherlock to move on, giving him a sharp look._

 _Sherlock glared at him, but complied._

 _As Sherlock entered the lab, Jim looked up from the sample he'd been working at._

" _How did it go?" he asked acidly. "Did Big Brother get you off? Again?"_

 _Sherlock sneered at him. "Mind your own business," he said. He put a box on the table and began gathering up stuff, throwing it in haphazardly._

" _Hey…" Jim walked over and put a hand on Sherlock's arm. "What are you doing? Are you being transferred? They can't do that. I… We need you here."_

" _I tried telling them that," Sherlock said. "But they're putting me into stasis anyway. For eighteen months."_

 _Jim seemed about to protest but was cut off by a happy bark, followed by a beautiful but fragile looking dog, padding eagerly across the lab to butt its nose against Sherlock's knee._

" _Victor!" Sherlock exclaimed, kneeling to face the dog, while taking its head between his hands and ruffling its ears lightly. He glanced up at Jim. "Could you give us a moment?"_

 _Jim huffed, but then turned around and left the lab, pausing right outside the door, leaving it slightly ajar so he could listen in._

" _I would ask you to stick around until I get back," Sherlock said, gently petting the dog's head. "But I guess we both know that is not going to happen. I'm sorry I won't be here, but there's nothing I can do about that."_

 _Victor sat down and whimpered softly._

" _I know," Sherlock said, stroking down the dog's back. "It sucks. It really does. I'm going to miss you. You were my best friend on this ship. My only friend, probably."_

 _Whimpering again, Victor nuzzled Sherlock's hand and then looked up at him, blinking._

 _Sherlock sighed. "So I guess this is goodbye." He hesitated, then held out his hand. Victor put his paw in it, then leaned in and licked Sherlock's cheek before getting to his feet with a soft groan and trotting away, tail and ears hanging down dejectedly._

…

" _Hurry up, freak," Sergeant Anderson drawled, tapping his foot as Sherlock_ _packed away the last of his belongings._

 _Sherlock didn't even look at him, but just huffed before closing the locker with a loud clang that made Anderson jump in surprise. Then he turned on his heel and marched down the corridor, the sergeant having to jog a bit to catch up, while also trying to give the impression that he was the one leading Sherlock to the stasis pods._

" _So is it going to hurt?" he asked once he had adjusted to Sherlock's fast pace._

" _Haven't you ever travelled interstellar?" Sherlock asked, raising his eyebrows._

" _No…"_

" _I won't feel a thing," Sherlock said. "Obviously."_

 _Anderson snorted. "Yeah, obviously. I bet you don't know either how that thing works. You're just showing off again."_

 _Sherlock rolled his eyes and said, without even pausing for a breath: "The stasis room creates a static field of time. Just as X-rays can't pass through lead, time cannot penetrate the stasis field. So although you exist, you no longer exist in time and for you time itself does not exist. You see, although you're still a mass, you are no longer an event in space-time. You are a non-event mass with a quantum probability of zero."_

" _Oh, simple as that," Anderson said sarcastically._

 _"Yes, simple as that." Sherlock stopped in front of the heavy door with the small but thick window. "Now please... Let me in so I can cease existing in the same time-flow as you. Your idiocy is suffocating me."_

 _Anderson rolled his eyes and gave the door a rather sulky look. "It's not my fault, you know," he said._

 _"Wrong," Sherlock said. "It is very much your fault."_

 _Anderson glared at him. "What was I supposed to think when you came out of that office? You're always acting suspicious. I thought I finally knew why."_

 _"You could have listened to me when I told you not to open the canister. By subjecting the solution to the atmosphere of Red Dwarf, you compromised the pheromone and destroyed the evidence that would finally have put an end to Wilkes' plan to abuse most of the female crew." Sherlock rolled his eyes. "It's too late now anyway. Just get on with it."_

 _"Right..." Anderson looked a little contrite as he opened the door to the stasis pod. "There you go."_

 _Sherlock sighed and stepped inside. He turned to face the door and closed his eyes, retreating into his mind palace._

"Sherlock," Mycroft said, startling Sherlock from his musings. "Standing there and staring into the void will not hasten your return to Earth. Neither will an endless discussion of whether you were guilty or not. I suggest that you and Professor Moriarty get to work."

"Oh yes, Sherlock," Jim purred, winking at him. "Let's pick up where we left off."

"Can _I_ help?" John asked.

"Sure," Jim said. "Go sleep in a corner and we'll call you if we need anything fetched."

"We _have_ evolved, you know," John said, baring his teeth.

"You could have fooled me." Jim whirled around and disappeared in the direction of the lab.

"So there _are_ more of you?" Sherlock asked, studying John more intently.

"Of course," John said. "Just not on the ship..." He sighed. "They all went off in the shuttles. Those that survived the great tick plague."

Sherlock, who had been about to follow Jim, stopped. "Then why didn't you go with them? Why did you stay behind?"

"I couldn't," John said with a sigh. "I had to take care of my sister..."

"Your sister?" Sherlock took a step closer to him. "She was ill? She died?"

John nodded quietly, his eyes turned to the floor. "I failed."

"Failed? How?" Sherlock hesitated, then put a hand on John's shoulder. "What could you have done?"

"I should have saved her," John said. "But I couldn't."

"Well... No... If she was that ill, she must have needed a doctor..."

John frowned. "She _had_ a doctor."

"But..." Sherlock gaped at him. "But you're a... a _dog_..."

John looked up at him, frowning a little. "And a doctor. As I said, we evolved. We built our own civilisation. And we're spreading out to other planets to offer our help to other species."

"Oh…" Sherlock seemed to need a moment to process this. "So… A doctor? I think you could be useful in the lab."

"Thank you," John said. "I'd like to help."

"So if you'd actually _get_ to it," Mycroft said, "I can contact Earth, explain why the ship made such a long detour and request permission to land in, say, another eighteen months."

When Sherlock and John entered the bridge, Jim was already there, glaring at the main controls.

"What's wrong?" Sherlock asked, his concern not quite genuine.

"I... can't... touch anything!" Jim cried out, plunging his fist into one of the screens. "How am I supposed to do anything if I cannot even push a button?"

John looked amused. "You're a hologram. What did you expect? Everyone knows you're only an image."

"A projection capable of speech and holding your personality patterns," Mycroft corrected. "It will be quite unnecessary to touch anything anyway. All you need to concern yourself with is this." His face disappeared from the screen and was replaced by a swift string of calculations.

Still sulking, Jim focused on the screen and soon began rattling off numbers, which Sherlock typed in with his left hand while calling up and analysing an endless stream of schematics and diagrams on three other screens.

For a while John stood staring at him open-mouthed. Then he cleared his throat and asked: "What can I do?"

"Shut up," Jim suggested.

"Can you type?" Sherlock asked, not looking away from the screens. "Do you know how to use a computer?"

"I... I can try," John said, with a doubtful look at the keyboard.

"No!" Jim snapped. "If he messes up even one digit he will ruin the entire thing."

"He can do it," Sherlock said, taking a step to the right to make room for John. "Just press the number he says," he whispered.

John nodded, and for the first few numbers it worked. But then Jim began to speed up, rattling off numbers, and John just stood looking at the keyboard with a rather desperate expression. "Wait!" he said. "Not so fast!"

"He's useless," Jim cried. "Sherlock! You have to do it."

"Go practise over there," Sherlock whispered to John as he took over the keyboard. "You'll soon get the hang of it. Jim's just being a bitch."

…

Sherlock threw a minor tantrum when he discovered that Mycroft had arranged for him and Jim to share cabin 1B on deck 22.

"What does he need a cabin for?" he screamed at his brother's image on the screen. "He's a bleeding hologram. He doesn't even sleep."

"But I do need a place to call home," Jim said, settling on the bottom bunk, smiling smugly. A moment later he was on his feet again, glaring at John who had entered with a large bundle of blankets in his arms, looking around with an eager smile.

"No fucking way," Jim screeched. "I may have lost my sense of smell but no way I'm listening to dog farts all night."

Sherlock stepped up to defend him, but John just turned right around and left the room, looking dejected.

As the humans went to bed, John settled down to spend the night on his pile of blankets outside the door to their cabin. However, when Sherlock turned on the light next morning, John had somehow ended up inside the door. Jim, who had not heard him move, was furious but there wasn't much he could do about it.

They spent the day working on the bridge, John managing to be of a lot more useful than the day before. In the evening he settled down by the door, and in the morning he had moved to the middle of the cabin. Every night he moved a little closer to their bunks and Jim eventually gave up protesting, letting John settle down where he wanted to.

In between Sherlock's tantrums and Jim's fuming, they did manage to get some work done and on the sixth day Mycroft announced that all adjustments were made to achieve the required speed.

Jim and Sherlock merely smiled smugly and shared a reluctant nod of respect, but John was over the moon, unable in his excitement to settle down for longer than two minutes and driving Jim completely crazy as he ran across the room and called: "We did it!" every time someone met his eye.

However, when even John had calmed down a little, Mycroft started talking again.

"I am sorry to interrupt the celebrations -" the eyes on the screen glanced sceptically at Sherlock and Jim in turn, where they were still sitting at the terminals, "- but there is some bad news, too."

John pouted. "Do you _have_ to spoil the moment?"

"I'm afraid so," Mycroft said. "I received a reply from Earth. They are not giving Red Beard permission to land."

"What?" Sherlock jumped to his feet. "Why? What happened?"

"You did," Mycroft answered. "Upon hearing that there was only one survivor after the disaster, and that this survivor had a criminal record, they decided there was only one possible conclusion. You must have killed off the rest of the crew. Almost three thousand years, but they _still_ wouldn't listen to me when I told them that this explains only _some_ of the facts. They are unwilling to harbour a known criminal on a planet that has been through so much."

"That is outrageous," Sherlock cried. "I had nothing to do with what happened on this ship. I was frozen, for God's sake!"

"I know. But they believe that you only went into stasis later, delaying your return in the hope that all family members who could want revenge would long be forgotten. And they think that you programmed _me_ to change the logs to give you an alibi." Mycroft's expression made it very clear what he thought of the idea that _Sherlock_ could make him do _anything_. "Fortunately, there is one young man at the Base who will listen to reason. After a very long and, to my great surprise, rather pleasant chat, Defence Intelligence Captain Greg Lestrade has agreed to prepare the papers that will clear your name as soon as you have sent definite proof of your innocence."

"I shouldn't have to," Sherlock said, pouting.

"Petulance will not alter the facts," Mycroft replied.

"But what can he do?" John asked, looking desperate. "If they won't believe a… a computer… I mean, it sounds like they won't even give him a chance! How is he supposed to convince them?"

"By demonstrating his case profoundly and indisputably," Mycroft said. "For if he can't, we will be floating around space for all eternity."


	2. Parallel Universe

"They can't keep you off Earth," Jim said as he entered the cabin. "It's just plain ridiculous. As you said, you were in stasis when it happened. Proving your innocence will be child's play."

"I don't know." Sherlock followed him inside and headed straight for his bunk. "We're going to have to figure out what actually happened." He lay down and closed his eyes.

John entered too and looked at Sherlock with a worried expression. "Are you sleepy? After _that_?"

Jim shushed him. "He's _thinking_ ," he said, making a show of tiptoeing to his own bunk. "Or at least that's what he says he's doing. Personally I think it's just an act to hide the fact that he doesn't have a clue."

John frowned at him. "Well, if he doesn't have a clue, thinking sounds like the best thing to do."

"Whatever," Jim said, lying down and picking up one of his virtual books. "Why don't you go chase your tail or something?"

John rolled his eyes and lay down on his blankets. "I wish I could help," he muttered.

…

John lay on his side, snoring, his arms stretched out before him. Soon he started twitching, soft whines punctuating the snores. He scratched the floor with his fingernails and then turned over, tossing the blanket off him, but still asleep. The snores grew even louder on his other side, as did the whines, and when he actually let out a 'woof!', Jim tossed his book away and sat up.

"I don't have to put up with this!" he huffed and got to his feet, stalking out of the room.

The cabin was quiet for a while. Then Sherlock smiled and muttered: "Thank you."

"Hmm?" John said, sitting up and looking at Sherlock with a small smile of his own.

"If you keep that up, he may just decide to never come in here again."

John chuckled. "Then I probably _should_ keep it up."

"Please do." A small giggle escaped Sherlock.

"Are you still thinking?" John asked.

"I'm trying," Sherlock said. "But it's kind of difficult when my toes feel like they're freezing off. Why are all blankets on this vessel made for midgets?"

"I think they are just right," John said. He studied Sherlock for a moment and then got up, dragging a blanket with him. He climbed onto the bed and curled up on top of Sherlock's feet.

Sherlock stared at him for almost a minute. Then he smiled and closed his eyes. "That was a very clever solution. Thank you."

"You're welcome," John said cheerily. "This is definitely more comfortable than the floor. And now you can do some good thinking."

"I'm afraid another visit to your mind palace will have to wait," Mycroft's voice sounded. "There is an emergency. I have detected a gravitational singularity, and the fact that it's close enough to detect means that we are in its field…"

"You managed to fly us into a black hole?" Sherlock asked calmly, opening one eye. "Poor Mycroft. Your age must be catching up with you."

The image rolled its eyes. "It's a black hole. In spite of your belief, I'm not actually so almighty that I can go against a force like _that_."

"What the hell?" Jim roared, running into the cabin. "Are you trying to get us all killed? Again?" Then he noticed John in Sherlock's bunk and lost the power of speech. He stared for several seconds, then spun around and left as quickly as he had come.

John followed him with his eyes, looking a little confused. "Is it _that_ dangerous?" he asked.

Sherlock smiled as he raised an eyebrow. "Could be…"

There was a sharp jolt and Mycroft's screen flickered out.

"What..." John started, but then his face was stretched out very long and squashed together from the sides. A moment later everything went blurry. Every object in the cabin lost its shape and turned into a swirl of colours, until everything was blended into one large spiral. And then, suddenly, it all went back to normal.

Except...

A loud hiss sounded.

"What? What? What?" John yapped.

And from the other end of the bed came a shocked gasp.

"I... I... I'll just..." the brown-haired girl, who was sitting half on top of Sherlock, stammered. She scrambled away from him, but in her haste her foot hooked behind John's leg and she crashed to the floor.

With uncanny elegance, the blonde woman, who had been curled up where John was now sitting, leaped to the floor. "Are you okay?" she asked as she helped the brunette to her feet.

Then she glared at Sherlock and John. "Who are you? What are you doing here?" she spat. "Answer me!"

John jumped from the bed, putting himself between Sherlock and the women. "I could ask you the same!" he barked. "What are you doing on our ship?"

"Your ship? This is _our_ ship!" the blonde hissed, baring some large and very sharp looking teeth.

"You're both right." Sherlock and the brunette had spoken at the same time. After a glance and a nod from Sherlock, the woman blushed and elaborated: "This is the research ship Red Beard. At least... that's what _we_ call it."

Sherlock gave her a short nod and she continued: "So... we are the crew. All of us, only in parallel dimensions."

"It seems the events leading up to this moment were pretty similar in both worlds." Sherlock looked around the room. "Except with different... players..."

"Well..." The brunette let out a nervous giggle. "I suppose introductions are in order. I'm Molly Hooper and this is my cat, Mary. Well, not quite _my_ cat, she's her own cat, but..." She cleared her throat and looked up at Sherlock. "I'm guessing you're me, then. I wouldn't have thought I looked so... erm, like you."

Just as Sherlock was introducing himself and John, Jim burst through the door of the cabin again. "You cannot do this to me!" he cried, gesturing at the pretty dark-haired hologram who was hot on his heels. "How dare you replace me?"

"Replace you?" the woman snapped. "I was here first and..." Then they both spotted the others.

"What is going on here?" they asked in unison. "Who are they?"

"Yes, I was going to tell you," Molly said. "We also have a hologram. Interesting that the ship can sustain you both now... This is Janine Donlevy, my colleague and friend. Or well, she was."

"Oh, surely you're still friends, dear," the voice of an older woman sounded from the screen, which was flickering back on. Her kind face appeared next to Mycroft's scowl.

"Yes," Molly answered, "but I still have to accept that she's no longer really here... She's only a projection. The real Janine is dead."

"But isn't it beautiful how that kind of thing doesn't matter anymore these days?" the woman's head said. "In my day I'd have been so happy if a computer could bring back my friends like that. Making sure I wasn't all alone on a ship. Maybe that's easy to forget with all these dishy men around..."

Mycroft glared at her. "Mrs Hudson, may I remind you that this is not supposed to be a cosy tea party? This event, two ships from different dimensions blending into one, could mean the end of the universe!"

"Oh, relax, sweetheart," Mrs Hudson replied. "As long as we are stuck in here, we won't affect the universe. You should get a grip on those nerves of yours. Would you perhaps like to try one of my digital soothers?"

Mycroft sputtered in indignation.

"Can you make him a virtual cuppa?" Sherlock asked, visibly struggling to keep a straight face.

"Oh, of course," Mrs Hudson answered, and a teacup appeared on the screen, close to Mycroft's face. "But just this once, dear. I'm your computer, not your housekeeper!"

In spite of Sherlock's mirth, Molly's expression had fallen. "We really _are_ stuck here, aren't we?" she said. "I mean... It's a black hole. How are we ever supposed to get away from here?"

The teacup tilted, giving Mycroft a sip. "There may be a way," he said thoughtfully. "It would be awfully dangerous and there is no way of knowing for certain that it would work, but... it's not impossible."

Sherlock was about to comment when Mary let out an outraged wail and slapped John in the face, leaving two angry red lines across his nose.

"I wasn't _doing_ anything!" John protested, cautiously touching the scratch marks. "I was only trying to be friendly!"

"You were trying to smell my bum!" Mary cried. "What kind of pervert are you?"

"I was just curious!" John replied, looking hurt. "You smell like nothing I've smelled before."

"Oh? You've smelled a lot of bums, have you?"

"He's a dog," Sherlock cut in. "That's how they say hello."

John nodded earnestly. "His smells great," he said, pointing at Sherlock. "And so do you, now I've gotten used to it," he continued, "though you smell... less safe."

"Go for my hindquarters again and it'll be the last thing you'll ever smell." Mary made another swipe at John, who jumped out of reach with a yelp.

"Never mind your puppy's bad habits," Mycroft said from the screen, "you need to get to work, Sherlock. The longer you wait, the closer you will be to the singularity's centre and the harder to move out of its field."

"I'll help," Molly offered immediately. "We, uhm, we might make a good team. Being the same person in a different universe and all."

"You will need us," Jim said at once.

"Yes," Janine cut in. "We were always smarter."

Without waiting for a response, the two holograms turned on their heels and marched out of the cabin.

"So..." John said, staring a little sadly at Molly and Sherlock's backs as they followed the others out. "Just us then."

Mary huffed and climbed into the top bunk, curling up in one end. "Feel free to join them," she sneered. "I am going to get back to doing what's important: finishing the nap you so rudely interrupted." She yawned.

John hesitated. "I was taking a nap too," he said. "But then I had a nightmare. Which was good, because it made Jim leave, and that makes Sherlock happy. I like making Sherlock happy. But then I was going to take another nap on his legs and... you happened."

"You're a real pleaser, huh?" Mary asked, smiling a little. "You're welcome to use the other bunk. Janine doesn't really need it." She yawned again.

John settled into the lower bed. He was quiet for a moment, but then said: "Mary?"

Mary whined. "What?"

"I'm sorry about sniffing you. I really didn't want to make you uncomfortable."

"I'm sorry about scratching you," Mary responded. "Oh no, wait... I'm not. You deserved that."

"I guess." John looked rather upset as he rubbed his nose again. Then he shifted in the bed, but still didn't seem to find a comfortable position. "Are you alone?" he asked after a few seconds. "I mean, the only... cat?"

There was a long pause. "I am now," she muttered. "There used to be hordes of us. So many that it became impossible to live together. We fought and then... Most of the survivors took a shuttle and just... left..."

"Oh," John said. "My friends left too. But we didn't fight. Why did you stay on the ship? Do you have a brother?"

"I have no one," Mary said softly. "I was orphaned in the fights. I did not want to go with the cats who killed my family."

"I'm so sorry," John said, looking shocked. "That's horrible."

"It's fine," Mary said. "The humans are good company."

…

"Gross!" Jim cried out as he entered the room and saw the two curled up in the top bunk. "That has got to be illegal!"

"Get your head out of the gutter," Janine said, giggling as she slapped his arm. "They're cute. Don't wake them."

"Huh?" John's head appeared from where it had been buried in Mary's hair. "Sherlock?"

"Your master's not here," Jim sneered, walking over to his bunk. "Though by the looks of it, you haven't missed him much."

Janine went to the screen over the sink. "Hudders," she called. "Can you bring up the numbers on the magnetic trap? I'd like another look."

Mary sat up, yawned and stretched, almost kicking John out of the bed. "Dogs make pretty decent cuddlers," she concluded. "That was a very good nap."

"Oh," Jim huffed. "Is that what you call it? I thought you two were supposed to be mortal enemies or something."

"Stop projecting," Sherlock said, entering the room, followed by Molly. "Just because you don't get along with anybody it does not mean the rest of us are incapable of acting like decent beings."

Mrs Hudson's face appeared next to the string of numbers on the screen. "Now, boys," she chided, "arguing won't make your work go faster."

"So you did find a way to make us move?" John asked.

"We did," Sherlock said. "But we need time to stabilise."

"Ten hours," Molly added, nodding.

"So then we can continue our way to Earth?" John asked. "All of us?"

"Both versions of the ship will go their own way, of course," Mycroft answered.

"Oh," John said. "So Mary and Molly and Janine and Mrs Hudson... They're not coming with us?"

"We can't," Mary said, reaching out to stroke John's hair gently.

"If any of us were to enter the others' dimension, we would create a paradox," Jim said, clearly enjoying their distress. "The consequences would be disastrous."

"We think," Janine added, earning herself an angry glare from Jim.

"So... So we can never see each other again?" John said softly.

"I'm afraid so," Molly said, biting her lip, her eyes on Sherlock.

Sherlock didn't notice, but went over to help comfort John. "But we'll be going home," he said. "To Earth."

John sighed. "I don't even know what to expect of it. I've only ever known our ship. And the vids don't tell me much either. Some show the planet full of odd green bendy things, others all empty or crowded with rectangular blocks..."

"Earth is not the same all over," Sherlock explained. "There are cities, but also areas where nature is still dominant. Though… I don't know if this might have changed over the past millennia. But… There'll be other dogs, there."

"Oh." John seemed to cheer up immediately. "That sounds nice. And… Are there cats, too?"

"Last time I was there," Sherlock said, nodding.

"But you got to remember," Jim cut in, "they're just… ordinary cats and dogs. Which, I suppose, should put them right on your level."

"Great!" John beamed.

"Not great," Mary said, glaring at Jim. "He is insulting you." She turned to John. "By 'ordinary' he means animals. Not smart like you and me. Or even able to talk."

"Oh." John frowned. "But we can teach them, right?"

Sherlock and Molly shook their heads slowly.

"I'm afraid it's not that simple," Sherlock said.

"They can only be trained at a rather basic level," Molly said. "The dogs, that is. The cats… Well. They won't really want to listen. At least my Toby didn't, and Mary definitely inherited those genes."

"We'll listen if it's worth listening to," Mary said, sticking her nose in the air.

"But why are they so different?" John asked. "Surely they evolved too in all that time?"

"Three thousand years isn't all that long," Mycroft said. "We are not quite sure what happened to your species on the ship, but it can't have been entirely natural."

"I suppose the virus could have triggered something in their genes," Janine suggested.

"Right," Jim said. "So they'll have begun mutating around the same time that the crew died."

"The virus?" Molly asked, looking confused.

"The crew's direct cause of death," Mycroft explained. "An alien virus was being researched in a lab under quarantine at the time. But apparently the quarantine was broken and the only survivors outside of stasis were the dogs. Or, in your world, the cats."

"What?" Sherlock roared. "You knew this and didn't tell me? How can they blame me for that?"

"Or me?" Molly said. "Mrs Hudson?"

"Well, dear," Mrs Hudson answered, "you _are_ the only survivor. And the virus was being researched in a lab under your command, so… It's not _that_ far-fetched."

"Oh..." Sherlock looked down. "The Reichenbach virus..." He turned to Jim. "That's the one that killed you?"

Jim nodded and smiled, though it lacked his usual confidence. "Not the best way to go," he said.

"But at least it was quick," Janine added.

"I was lucky to be in my office when it happened, so I could seal the doors," Mycroft said. "That way I survived long enough to activate the necessary features in the computer. I assume Mrs Hudson had the same idea."

Mrs Hudson nodded. "Someone had to take care of those poor dears who survived the drama."

"The dogs, you mean?" Sherlock asked.

"Well... At the time I didn't know about the cats yet," Mrs Hudson said. "I was simply hoping there would be more crew members who had found a place of safety, like the stasis pods. But once I was uploaded and scanned them... It was just Molly and those odd non-human lifeforms that turned out to be kittens."

"Before you judge us," Mycroft continued, "there was no way for us to know what exactly was happening. The ship's cameras and microphones weren't functional until we were in the system and switched them back on."

"So that's why you wouldn't let me see the log?" Sherlock asked, smirking at his brother. "It wasn't there?"

"Oh, the log is there, dear," Mrs Hudson answered. "But at the crucial moment, nothing was recorded."

...

"So are you trying to tell me that little Miss Bashful here is under suspicion of murder too?" Jim asked incredulously. All of them, except Mary and John, had gone to the mess, so Sherlock and Molly could get a meal from one of the vending machines.

"What?" Janine snapped. "Can't women be guilty of mass killings? Or is that a strictly male thing?"

"Janine," Molly said, giving her friend a look before she directed herself to the other hologram. "Just like Sherlock I'm the only survivor, and I was working on a vaccine."

"So who did you piss off to get yourself stuck in stasis?" Jim asked, his grin widening.

"Captain Louisa Carmichael," Molly sighed. "I had to appear before her because I had caught a crew member in some very dubious research. But Sergeant Donovan was convinced I'd broken into the Corporal's office. And the captain would probably have understood, if only I hadn't made that stupid joke about the ghost and the dead husband…"

"Fascinating," Jim said, standing suddenly. "Why don't you tell me more while accompanying me to the control room?"

Molly stared at him, taken aback. "I… We… Just us?"

"Well, I just need one pair of hands to push some buttons," Jim said, grinning cheekily. "But if you think we need a chaperone…" He glanced at the other two.

"No, no, of course not," Molly stammered. "You can just sit and enjoy your food… Sherlock, I mean. Janine can just… enjoy the view…" She blushed spectacularly and almost stumbled over her chair in her haste to get away from the mess.

Jim looked down at Sherlock. " _She_ 's supposed to be your parallel?" he asked. "I don't think I've ever seen you that flustered. Have you been hiding your mushy side from me all these years?" He winked and then left after Molly.

"God... I'm not that bad, am I?" Janine asked, staring after him. "I mean, I like to tease Molly but he's just mean."

"That," Sherlock said, taking a sip from his bottle, "is an understatement, I'm afraid."

"Oh, so you do have a mushy side?" She raised her eyebrows, smiling.

Sherlock chuckled. "No. That part was true. I am not exactly what you'd call sentimental."

Janine grinned at him. "Then I guess Jim and I aren't the only ones who are not exactly identical. Molly is about as sentimental as they get." She shook her head. "I'm serious. One time she cried for an hour because she found one of Toby's old toys."

"Toby?" Sherlock's brow furrowed in thought. "That was her cat, right?"

"Yeah," Janine said. "I mean, it was originally part of a test group we were using in one of the psych tests, but she took a shine to that old Tom and wouldn't let him be taken away with the others. So we let him live in our lab as long as he didn't mess with any of the samples."

Sherlock smiled and shrugged. "I guess we're not completely different."

Janine cocked her head. "No, I guess not," she said. "Judging from the way John looks at you, you're not as cold as you seem to think."

"And you may not be cruel, but I suspect that you are as observant and… calculating as Jim."

She giggled. "The pets are obvious," she said. "But what about the computers? What do those two have in common? That Mike of yours seems a lot less dotty and… old…"

"Mycroft," Sherlock corrected her, barely hiding his smile. "But I think I've spotted the similarity."

"Oh?" Janine raised her eyebrows again.

"Mother figures," Sherlock whispered, taking another quick sip.

…

"So… What do you want me to do?" Molly asked, looking around the control room uncertainly.

"Well," Jim said. "Your main task might be a little difficult. But I have complete faith in your ability to carry it out."

"Oh?" Molly looked even more desperate.

"Yes," Jim said, his smile widening. "Could you possibly shut up while I think?"

"Oh." Molly frowned. "Sorry… But you asked me to come along, so I thought…"

"That I wanted to get to know you a little better?" Jim laughed as he examined the screens. "Enlarge that, please," he said, pointing. "And see if you can find the readings from twelve hours before the singularity was spotted."

Molly nodded and obeyed.

"So, you and Sherlock…" she said after a while. "Are you friends, too? Because Janine and I are, but you didn't seem very nice to him, so I'm not sure…"

Jim seemed to hesitate for just a second. "Oh, we're great friends," he said. "But we're men, you know. We don't show it the same way you girls do."

"I see," Molly said. Again she was silent for a while, but then asked: "What's he like?"

"He's a bit arrogant. As you might have noticed." Jim pointed out another screen and waited for her to type in the commands. "But I guess he has his reasons. It's not easy always being one of the smartest people in the room. You must get that too, right?"'

Molly blushed. "I… I hardly ever consider myself the smartest person in the room. I mean, I'm sure Janine is smarter. And even Mary, in her own way. I mean, even though she's a cat."

"I see." Jim raised a single eyebrow as he studied her, then turned towards the screen and ignored her completely for a while.

A few times, Molly took a deep breath, as though she wanted to say something, but always changed her mind at the last moment. Finally she asked: "How long have you known him?"

"A couple of millennia," Jim said. Then he giggled. "Actually, I've only known him a few months. But we've been working so close together that it feels like much longer. I think it's fair to say that I was his best friend on the ship. Even before the accident. Maybe except for his dog, but who can compete with that, right?"

Molly laughed. "It does look like he adores John."

"I wouldn't say adore," Jim said quickly. "But yeah… John reminds him of his real dog, Victor, so of course he enjoys his attention."

Molly nodded. "Just like Mary sometimes reminds me of Toby. Though I'm even fonder of her, since she can actually talk back."

Jim stared blankly at the screen for a moment. "Yeah, well," he said, finally. "Sherlock doesn't like it when people talk back to him."

"Oh," Molly said. "We really are very different, then. I think talking with someone can be very illuminating. Just explaining a thought process and having someone ask the right questions. It really helps with the work."

"Oh, Sherlock and I have conversations," Jim said. "But it's different with John. He's not on the same level, you know. He just… barks with words."

"He sounded pretty intelligent for a dog, I thought," Molly said thoughtfully.

"Yeah… For a dog…"

"Hey, you two!" Janine cried, popping her head into the control room. "We've found a virtual Cluedo. Come on. Let's gang up on Sherlock!"

…

"It's not actually possible for the victim to have done it, Sherlock!" Molly snapped, looking very red and angry.

"But it's the only possible solution," Sherlock said, looking both confused and annoyed.

"It's not in the rules!" Janine insisted.

"Then the rules are wrong!" Sherlock huffed and got to his feet.

While both women stared at Sherlock in exasperation, Jim leaned back, chuckling. "I told you…" he muttered to Molly.

"He's impossible!" Molly complained. "One little mistake and he throws everything overboard just to prove he's clever, like we don't know he has the gifts to win a game like this easily!"

"I did _not_ make a mistake!" Sherlock said, leaning over the board and tapping the various rooms one by one. "I put all the clues together. The only way I could be wrong is if one of you gave me false information at one point!" He glared around at them. "I eliminated the impossible and what remained…"

"Oh, just admit it, Sherl," Janine said. "You overlooked something. It can happen to the best of us."

"But I _am_ the best of us!" Sherlock cried, slamming the table so hard that the image of the board flickered and then turned bright purple.

"I hope that's _your_ ship he's breaking," Jim whispered to Molly, giggling.

"Sherlock…" Molly said, putting a gentle hand on his shoulder. "It's only a game. There's really no shame in admitting you've lost."

"I didn't lose!" Sherlock screamed and then stormed out of the room.

…

Two pairs of wide eyes stared at Sherlock as he slammed the door to the cabin open. John and Mary were sitting close together on the bottom bunk, their heads resting against each other.

"Sherlock?" John asked warily, straightening up.

Sherlock stomped over to the table and sat down. "Don't mind me," he huffed. "Unless you want to laugh at me too."

John frowned. "Why would we want to laugh at you? What happened?"

"Nothing. Just a conspiracy to make me lose my mind." Sherlock ruffled his hair aggressively and then glared at the wall. "Mycroft!" he called. ""How much longer will it be before we can get out of here?"

"Half an hour less than last time you asked, Sherlock," Mycroft's head answered, trying to dodge a very insistent teacup which had been attempting to soothe him every time Sherlock had asked that question.

"So what am I supposed to do until then?" Sherlock asked.

"You could take a nap," Mary suggested, yawning.

"Yes, why don't you join us here?" John asked eagerly.

"Or not," Mary interjected quickly.

"She's right," Sherlock said, standing up and walking over. "On both accounts." He lifted himself up into the top bunk. "Wake me when this hell is over."

"I wouldn't call it hell," John said, nuzzling Mary's neck, making her giggle.

"I suppose you wouldn't," Sherlock said. "I guess it all depends on which bunk you're in."

John frowned and looked up at the bed above him. "Do you think I should join him?" he whispered to Mary.

"He'll be fine," Mary said, pulling John closer. "And besides, once you go back you two can snuggle all the time."

John nodded. "And you won't be there," he sighed.

Mary sighed too. "That can't be helped."

…

They all gathered in the cabin for breakfast, Jim still being rather nasty to Sherlock about the outcome of last night's game, apparently oblivious to the fact that everybody else was growing quite tired with the subject.

Finally Janine managed to deflect him by recounting some of the more interesting facts that had popped up when she and Jim had engaged in a little late night round of Never Have I Ever. Jim was on the brink of what promised to be a rather magnificent tantrum when Mycroft's head popped up on the screen, clearing his non-existing throat meaningfully.

"Ooh-oo," Mrs Hudson said, appearing next to Mycroft and making his head turn so fast that it was just a blur on the screen.

"Ooh-oo?" he repeated, scrunching up his nose. "What kind of a sound is that for a respectable A.I.?"

"Shush, dear," Mrs Hudson said. "Molly, has the antimatter been prepared for the procedure?"

"It is ready," Sherlock said, but he was interrupted by Mary, who pushed John away so she could sit up straight.

"Wait, what?" she gasped. "The antimatter? Doesn't the ship need that to… y'know… fly?"

"Well, we need to fly away from here, so that makes sense, right?" John said.

"We can't fly away from here," Janine explained. "We're in a pocket universe. We need to create a force strong enough to counter the gravity of the singularity. But in doing so we will be burning up our entire supply in one burst."

"What then?" Mary asked. "We'll escape from here and then just float randomly through space?"

"The ship can still fly on liquid oxygen," Sherlock answered. "But only at subluminal speed."

"If we use the antimatter for this, then we will no longer be able to gain the speed necessary to reach Earth within your lifespan…" Janine added.

"So we might as well stay?" John asked hopefully, putting an arm around Mary's waist.

"Sure we can," Janine said. "If you don't mind causing the collapse of the rest of the universe."

"Theoretically we should be fine," Jim said. "Stuck together forever in our own little pocket of non-reality." He looked around the room. "Not sure the rest of us would enjoy it, though…"

"We'd make the _universe_ collapse?" John actually took a step back from Mary, his eyes wide.

"For them it would only last a few minutes more," Mycroft said, nodding. "I don't advise you to take that course."

"No…" John frowned. "I don't want that."

"So we use up the antimatter and get away from here," Molly concluded.

"Yes," Sherlock agreed. "Time to get into positions, people."

"What does he mean?" Mary asked Molly, looking very suspicious.

"We need to return to the exact places where we were when our ships blended into one," Molly explained. "At least, we think we should. So Jim and Janine have to leave the room and the four of us have to get back into bed." She gave the small upper bunk a doubtful look.

"All of us? In that?" Mary looked positively rebellious. "There's no room. There wasn't room until you fell out. Remember?"

"I'm sure we can make it work," Molly muttered, looking away. "I was just… startled."

It took a lot of shuffling, some apologising and a bit of blushing, but finally all four of them were squeezed into the cramped area of the upper bunk.

"Oh, no need to hurry," Mycroft sneered. "The universe will wait until you're all quite comfortable."

"No need to be nasty," Mrs Hudson told him off. "It _is_ quite a small space to hold four adults, as your calculations should be telling you!"

"Don't mind us." Mary's voice sounded muffled from behind John. "Just finish your little debate before sending us all home."

"Alright. Everybody ready?" Mycroft asked, and then everything went black.


	3. The Last Day

Sherlock was sitting on the floor of the lab, humming softly as he idly bounced a small rubber ball against the wall opposite the counter he was leaning against.

John was sitting next to him on a stool, resting an elbow on the clean white surface and staring into the distance with an empty expression, his feet dangling at the height of Sherlock's shoulder. He let out a deep sigh.

Sherlock glanced over at him. "Bored?" he asked, frowning a little.

"Huh?" John blinked and looked over at him as though he hadn't realised Sherlock was in the room. "No… Not really."

"Okay." Sherlock shrugged and resumed his bouncing.

"Can we really never see them again?" John asked after a moment. "I mean, in a way that wouldn't make the universe explode?"

"I doubt it," Sherlock said. "The odds of us meeting even once were astronomical. Even if we hit another black hole and got transported to a parallel reality, it would not be the same one. There might not be a Red Beard. Or I might not have survived. Maybe it would be crewed by Anderson, Wilkes and a… a pony instead." He laughed at the idea.

"Right." John's sigh was even deeper than the first and he just sat there, following the movements of the rubber ball with his eyes.

Sherlock glanced over at him. He caught the ball, held it in his hand for a moment, then threw it again, smiling as John sat up a little straighter. "You like balls?" he asked, catching it again.

"Yeah," John answered, looking at Sherlock's hand and licking his lips.

Sherlock threw the ball again. "Would you… Would you like to play?" he asked.

For a moment John seemed to grow, his eyes widening and his mouth slightly open, on its way to a smile. But then he deflated completely. "Maybe another time."

Sherlock frowned again. "If you're sure," he said, putting the ball in his pocket. He got to his feet with a soft groan and settled on one of the stools. "Victor liked balls. We could play for hours."

"Victor?" John repeated with a frown. "That was the name of our Great Father. The one we all descended from."

"Can't have been my Victor," Sherlock said. "He was neutered when he was a puppy. He can't have fathered anyone…"

"Neutered?" John tilted his head.

Sherlock had opened his mouth to answer but then seemed to change his mind. "Oh, uhm… Just a precaution humans would sometimes take with their pets. To… protect them and make them more… comfortable."

"Oh." John smiled. "That sounds like something the Protector would do. But why would it mean he can't be our Father?"

"Because they had given him the snip," Jim said, sauntering into the room. "You know… Cut them off…" He held out his hands and did a little twirl. "What do you think?" he asked Sherlock.

John stared at him in shock. "Cut… cut his…?" He swallowed.

"Yup," Jim said. He put his hands on his hips and glared at Sherlock. "The suit? What do you think? I had your brother dig it up for me. It's a genuine replica of a Westwood."

"You look fine," Sherlock huffed, walking over to pat John on the shoulder. "He was just a regular dog," he said softly. "He wasn't like you at all. It was considered a kindness. To help him be calmer."

"Fine!" Jim snapped. "A cup of tea is 'fine'... This is _perfection_!"

"I can't believe our god would allow something like _that_ ," John said, looking very distressed. "Even with a primitive dog."

"Your god?" Sherlock asked, his tone now more eager than consoling. "You have a god? A… A dog god?"

Jim stared at him, appalled. Then he huffed and stalked away from them, looking for a reflecting surface so he could admire himself, since nobody else was going to.

"Yeah," John said. "Don't you know about the god? I thought everyone knew the stories."

"I've been asleep, remember?" Sherlock said, sitting down next to John. "Please tell me."

"Well, it was the god who chose Victor and bestowed upon him the gift and curse of intellect," John said. "Sheriarty is the protector of all dogs, the One who both blesses and tests us."

"Who?" asked Sherlock, immediately echoed by Jim who hurried back, suddenly interested in the conversation.

"She… Sheriarty," John repeated, a little taken aback by their sudden interest. "Now you mention it, that does sound a bit like your name…"

"Like _our_ names, you mean," Jim said, grinning crookedly.

Sherlock looked at him for a moment, then shook his head slowly. "I guess they must have heard or read them in the lab and somehow gotten them mixed up."

"No, it's an important part of our history," John protested. "We wouldn't get that mixed up. Victor, the chosen one, was Sheriarty's dearest and only friend. But Sheriarty wanted to make him more like his own image, so he took all the dog's best features and combined them with all of his own. But as he made many puppies that way, he discovered that they weren't all alike, and that he didn't get along with all of them as well as with Victor. So he decided to test them, so that the nicest of them could survive."

"The nicest?" Jim made a disgusted sound. "That's a stupid criterion... "

"Not in a domesticated animal," Sherlock said. "I mean, that is a desired trait in most pets. Breeding for temperament and disposition."

"Oi," John said. "I'm not a pet, and I'd like to see anyone try breeding me for temperature and… what was the other thing?"

Jim snorted but Sherlock just smiled. "I didn't mean it like that, just… Maybe that's where the mythology stems from. From principles of canine cultivation. But why my dog has been named the sire is beyond me."

"And why you are wasting your time even thinking about it is beyond me," Jim interrupted. "I didn't just come here to show you my new awesome suit. While you have been playing, your brother and I have come up with a way to save your sorry arse."

"What?" Sherlock jumped to his feet, heading for the nearest screen. "Mycroft," he called. "What have you got?"

Mycroft's face appeared and said: "Do you remember L. ?"

"Light Focus Antimatter is just a theory," Sherlock said, shaking his head slowly. "It would indeed solve our problem, but no one has even managed to actually produce it."

"Because they didn't have the right elements to start from," Mycroft said. "But I showed Professor Moriarty the spectrograms resulting from a scan of our surroundings, and he agrees that it looks like H.O.U.N.D., the nearest asteroid, holds a mineral that might be of use to us."

"But collecting it will be risky," Jim interjected. "I think we should only send someone disposable." He gave John a significant look.

John nodded. "I'll fetch it. Uhm... What does it look like?"

"Don't listen to him," Sherlock said. "We'll both go."

"I'll set course for the asteroid, then," Mycroft said. "We should be landing in 23 minutes, so you'd better go and suit up."

"Great!" John exclaimed. "I would love to go outside and stretch my legs."

"Yeah, good idea," Jim said. "In space, no one can hear you yapping."

"Well, just keep the radio turned off and you should be fine," Sherlock told Jim, putting a hand on John's shoulder and leading him towards the door. "In fact, you should be glad of the opportunity to spend some time alone on the ship. Just you and your beloved suits."

…

"Brilliant!" John gasped as he skipped out of the ship, bouncing a few times before he found his footing again. Then he started running around, inspecting the irregular wall of dark rock and stopping every few feet to incline his head towards it.

Sherlock laughed. "What are you doing?"

"Sniffing around… But it's odd. It's like this place smells like dog breath."

"Could that possibly be because what you're in fact smelling is the air inside your helmet?"

"Oh, right." John chuckled.

Sherlock shook his head, smiling. "You've never been outside Red Beard before?"

"Oh, I have," John said, turning back to him. "It's just been a very long time. I was deployed at the planet Maiwand, but the Afghans clearly didn't want our help."

"Afghans? Those large dogs with the long fur?" Sherlock sounded incredulous. "From Earth?"

"No, they're the native species on the planet humans have called Maiwand," John explained. "But we'd seen the pictures in one of the Holy Scriptures from lab 207 and we thought the aliens looked like them, so we called them Afghans."

"I see," Sherlock said. "So you went to help them? How did that turn out?"

"Well, our scanners had detected a multitude of parasites on the planet, so we thought they'd be happy to see us," John said. "But as soon as we landed, they started shooting at us. I got a shot, myself."

"You got shot?" Sherlock turned to look at John. "Was it serious?"

"It turned out to save my life, but we didn't realise that at the time," John answered. "We were startled, so we returned to the ship and left. But then some other dogs started to find strange dark bumps on their skin. And after that, they got ill. Finally we realised that we must have brought some of the parasites onto the ship, and they were spreading quickly. Only me and the others who had gotten a shot were spared."

"So they weren't trying to fight you?" Sherlock asked. "They were inoculating you?"

John frowned. "Something like that, I guess. I suggested we should return to Maiwand, but those who weren't too ill to take part in the discussion were too offended or scared after the Afghans' actions to return. Eventually some did go there in a shuttle, but by that time Harry had been infected, and I couldn't leave her to die."

Sherlock put his hand on John's helmet, as if trying to comfort him. "I'm sorry," he muttered awkwardly.

"Well, it's a lot nicer to be out now," John said, looking around. "No one shooting smelly stuff at me and all that. Tracking down that mineral should be easy, right?"

"I suppose so. Mycroft is the one doing the actual tracking. We're just going to be picking it up."

…

"But don't you see?" Jim said, gesturing impatiently at Mycroft's image on the screen. "Right now, all I can do is sit here and wait for them to get back. But if you give me verbal control of the system, I can actually start programming the lab for the extraction. So we will be ready when they return."

"And I don't see why you cannot simply ask me to do it for you," Mycroft answered. "What good would direct command do you? My control makes mistakes impossible, so I would increase your efficiency."

"You would slow me down," Jim said. "Besides, you need to keep an eye on those two out there. I mean, Sherlock knows what he is doing, but do you really trust that pet to not screw things up?"

"I can divide my attention," Mycroft replied haughtily.

"Yeah, you can do everything," Jim huffed. "You're as dead as me, but while you get to run the entire ship, I just have to sit here and twiddle my thumbs? How is that fair? I need to do something. Be useful."

"Working with me _would_ be useful," Mycroft said.

"But then you might as well just be doing all of it." Jim clenched his hands and looked away. "You know you'd just be humouring me."

Mycroft sighed. "Fine, if it will make your moaning stop… I will give you voice command, but I _will_ keep listening so I can correct possible mistakes."

"Don't you trust me?" Jim looked like he just might start crying.

"No. I never have."

"Right…" Jim sighed. "I guess I'll just go watch a movie or something then…" He turned towards the door.

Mycroft rolled his eyes. "I have just switched on voice command for you. There is no need to be dramatic."

Jim grinned up at him. "Thank you," he said, rushing off.

…

"That was amazing!" John called as the airlock closed behind him and Sherlock and they started to shed the silver spacesuits. "I mean, the way you just _found_ that rock without ever having sniffed it…"

Laughing, Sherlock put his helmet on the shelf and ruffled his hair. "I couldn't exactly smell anything out there. Except myself. Good thing my brother has such a large nose."

"Yeah, that was really impressive," John agreed. He pulled down the trousers of his space suit a little too enthusiastically, and suddenly a small blond tuft of hair popped out above the waistband at the back of his normal trousers. "Oh, whoops."

"What is that?" Sherlock asked, chuckling as he leaned closer to study it. "Is that a… a tail?"

The stump drooped a little. "Yeah… Sorry you had to see it. It's not exactly… majestic…" John looked away, clearly feeling embarrassed.

"It's sweet," Sherlock said, smiling. "It suits you."

Immediately the tail perked up and started wagging. "Really?" John asked, looking up at Sherlock with hopeful eyes.

"Ahum," Mycroft said. "Has either of you seen Professor Moriarty?"

"Down on the asteroid?" Sherlock asked. "Of course not. He's here on the ship with you. Unless you've turned him off?" He almost sounded hopeful.

"I haven't," Mycroft said. "But he has gone off radar."

"Huh?" John said, pulling up his trousers so the tail was once again hidden. "But he's a hologram. How can _you_ not know where he is?"

"That is, indeed, the question," Mycroft said. "He asked me for verbal control of the terminals and once I gave in, he must have cut me off."

"You did _what_?" Sherlock roared. He didn't wait for an answer but raced down the corridor as fast as he could, John on his heels. "Where did you last see him?" Sherlock cried.

"Lab 207," Mycroft said. "He said he was preparing the element extraction, but that whole section has gone dark to me."

"Jim!" Sherlock cried, getting closer to the labs. He glanced quickly through every door that he passed and then stopped dead when he entered the main workshop. "What…?" He gasped, staring at Jim who was standing in the middle of the room, surrounded by a large number of suits ranging from light grey to dark blue hovering in the air around him.

The shorter man was looking almost desperate, but lit up when he saw Sherlock. "What do you think?" he asked. "Which one goes better with my eyes?"

"What are you doing?" Sherlock snapped, hurrying over to switch the cameras back on.

"Trying to pick what to wear when we get back to Earth, of course," Jim said. He pointed at one of the suits and said: "That one." A second later, the dark suit he was wearing, was replaced by an almost identical one with slightly larger buttons. Jim held out his arms and turned to face Sherlock.

"What do you think?" he asked, grinning.

"You turned off the surveillance so you could play dress up?" Sherlock huffed, approaching Jim with a menacing expression that made the hologram recoil.

"Yeah…" he squeaked. "I didn't want your brother peeping. He was really nasty last time I asked him to help me."

"Green just really doesn't work for you," Mycroft piped up. "And you were making me go through the entire database. That is no excuse for cutting me off."

"Just like you had no excuse for putting me in chequered plus fours!"

"You asked for every green variant available," Mycroft argued.

"Every green suit!"

John and Sherlock exchanged a bemused smile and then Sherlock nodded to the container in John's hands.

"Look what we fetched!" John called out, holding it out for them to see.

"Oh," Jim sneered. "You've finally managed to teach him a trick, Sherlock? Why not try something useful next time. Like 'play dead'."

"You mean like you?" John asked. "Anyway, this _is_ useful. We need this thing, right?"

"Indeed we do," Sherlock said. "Follow me."

…

Sherlock was double-checking the gauges on the matter converter when his brother appeared on the screen behind him.

"Sherlock," he said gravely. "Detective Inspector Captain Lestrade has contacted me. He did not bear good news."

"Oh?" Sherlock raised an eyebrow, smiling. "He's not really into head… I mean heads?"

Jim snorted but Mycroft just went on: "He just finished reviewing the logs of the time leading up to the disaster. It turns out that you may in fact be responsible for the outbreak."

"What do you mean?" Sherlock asked, his grin fading away. "What did he find?"

Mycroft's head moved to the side of the screen to make way for a video image of Sherlock in the lab, an old dog following his every movement.

"What's that?" John asked.

"That's Victor," Sherlock said, smiling fondly. Then he frowned. "Why are you showing me this?" he asked Mycroft. "This has got nothing to do with the outbreak."

"I'm afraid it does, Sherlock. Look." The image froze and zoomed in on the screen that Sherlock had just turned his back to.

The room was quiet for a moment. "No…" Sherlock whispered. "That can't be. I would never do something like that. You know I wouldn't."

"I don't see what you're doing wrong," John remarked. "You're just typing numbers."

"But I didn't type in _those_ numbers. I couldn't have."

"Oh come on, Sherlock," Jim said, raising his hand as if he wanted to pat Sherlock's shoulder. "You made a mistake. It happens."

"Not to me!"

"Remember the Cluedo game?" Jim looked genuinely distressed on Sherlock's behalf. "It may not have had as dire consequences as this, but…" He shrugged.

"I didn't make a mistake then!" Sherlock cried. He stomped his foot and then walked away from the others, flopping down in a corner and folding his arms around his knees, sulking.

"I still don't understand," John said. "Why is it so bad?"

Jim pointed at the screen. "Do you see that number?" he asked. "It says 9.2, right? It should have been 0.92."

"So?"

"We were testing the influence of heat on the Reichenbach virus, by gradually increasing the temperature in the containment unit. It was a carefully calculated experiment but…"

"But if the temperature were to rise too rapidly," Sherlock muttered from his corner, "it would compromise the stability of the magnetic field keeping the sample isolated."

"So if it got too warm, it could get out?" John tilted his head.

The other three nodded solemnly.

"But it was just a mistake," Jim said after a long uncomfortable silence. "I mean… This is not necessarily a bad thing. You were responsible, yes, but it's obvious from the footage that you did not do this intentionally. The most they can do is charge you for negligence. Right?"

Sherlock did not answer, but looked up at Mycroft's image. The brothers shared a look and then Sherlock gave a small nod and walked out of the room.

"Where are you going?" John called, making to follow him.

"Give him a moment," Mycroft said, and then disappeared from the screen.

…

"Now that we have reached superluminal speed, I have established a line of direct communication with Earth," Mycroft announced.

Sherlock, who had been hiding in the captain's old office for the past couple of hours, lifted his head off the desk and glared at the screen by the door. "And what good is that going to do us?" he asked.

"Detective Inspector Captain Lestrade requested to receive your statement as soon as possible. Being compliant might work in your favour."

"Right." Sherlock sighed, leaning back in the large leather chair and covering his face with his hands. Then he frowned and looked back at Mycroft. "Now?"

Mycroft nodded and moved aside, so the image of a grey-haired man at a desk took his place.

"Sherlock Holmes, I presume," he said. "I'm Greg Lestrade. As your brother may have told you, I'm leading the Red Beard investigation and came across new evidence a few hours ago."

Sherlock just looked blankly at the screen until the man continued:

"Would you care to give me your version of what happened?"

Sherlock opened his mouth, but at a small cough from his brother, he hesitated and took a deep breath.

"I was working in the lab," Sherlock said, his voice flat. "I checked the setting for the experiment. They were all correct. Including the rate of increase in temperature. My personal log will confirm it."

"I will be happy to provide you with it," Mycroft told Greg.

"I'm afraid that won't do you much good," the inspector answered. "The personal logs are inevitably subjective, so the public footage will always take precedence."

"But the footage is wrong!" Sherlock insisted, slamming his hand on the table.

"That's not possible," Greg replied.

"However," Mycroft said, "it is clear, even from that footage, that what happened was merely an accident. My brother may be responsible for the death of the crew, but the charge should not go beyond reckless conduct."

"Mycroft," Greg said. "If this were his first offence, things would have been different. But we all know that isn't the case."

Both images looked at Sherlock, Mycroft with obvious pain in his eyes.

"So because I was framed once, you'll just sit back and let it happen again?" Sherlock got to his feet. "Well, I guess that's it then. Do you want me to arrest myself right away? Just put myself back into stasis for the remainder of the journey. Or would you prefer I simply tossed myself out the airlock?"

"Nothing that dramatic," Greg said, managing a small smile. "But your ship has been ordered to change course to rendezvous with the prison ship Pentonville in the Old Bailey star system."

"We will need at least a day to decelerate enough to turn around," Mycroft informed him, "but then we will be on our way."

"Thank you for your cooperation," Greg said. "And Mycroft… I'm sorry about this."

"Yes. So am I."

…

"Are you sure this is necessary?" Jim asked, following close behind Sherlock as he strode down the corridor towards the airlock.

"Quite," Mycroft replied. "The lateral starboard sensors are malfunctioning and we cannot risk turning around without them."

"And we really, sincerely do want to turn around," Sherlock said wryly as he pulled a suit and helmet out of one of the lockers.

"Can't the dog do it?" Jim protested.

"Only Sherlock is qualified for this," Mycroft said.

Jim bit back another protest and just watched silently as Sherlock got ready and disappeared into the airlock. Rather than wait for the hiss indicating that the outer door had opened, he turned around and almost ran up to the control room, where John was practising his typing.

"Oh," he said, looking up and quickly spreading his hands over the keyboard, pretending he hadn't only been using his index fingers. "Hi, Jim. Where is Sherlock?"

"Outside," Jim said, rushing to a screen. "On!" he ordered, proceeding to circle through all exterior cameras on the starboard side of Red Beard. None of them picked up any signs of Sherlock.

"Can I go outside too?" John asked eagerly. "To help him?"

"No," Mycroft's voice sounded. "By the time you're suited up, Sherlock will be back inside."

"Oh." John bowed his head a little and then joined Jim in front of the screen. "Can you find him?"

Jim shook his head. "He's not in the line of sight of any of the cameras. Mycroft? Can we get an audio?"

"There you go," Mycroft said, and then a click and some white noise sounded before they heard Sherlock.

"Mycroft?" Sherlock's voice sounded over the speakers.

"Sherlock!" Jim began, but was interrupted by John: "Sherlock! Are you sure you don't want me to come help?"

"I am perfectly capable of replacing a faulty sensor by myself," Sherlock said curtly. "I will only be a few more minutes."

"Professor Moriarty," Mycroft interjected, "could you have a look at this for me?" The view on the centre screen changed to show part of the ship's aft and the space beyond. "What do you make of this?"

Jim squinted at the screen for a moment, then gasped. "Are those meteors? That's a meteor shower! Why did you not notice sooner? It's almost upon us!"

"Well," Mycroft said, "the lateral starboard sensors are malfunctioning."

"Sherlock!" John yelled. "Get away from there! You have to come back!"

"Just a moment," Sherlock's voice sounded. "I'm almost done here."

"No, Sherlock! Now!" Jim cried. "In less than a minute, it's going to be a shooting gallery out there. Look behind you!"

There was a moment of agonising silence and then Sherlock cursed softly. "It's too late," he said. "There's no way I can make it to the airlock."

"Can't you seek cover behind something?" Jim squealed. "You're a bloody genius. Use your giant brain!"

"Sherlock!" John shouted.

"I'm sorry, John," Sherlock said softly, sounding surprisingly calm. "I know it's not the first time you have been left behind and I wish there was some way of avoiding this but…" He was cut off by a sudden burst of static and both men in the control room gasped.

"Goodbye, John." Sherlock's voice was faint and distorted. Then all the screens went black and the entire ship quivered.

…

"When other dogs died," John said quietly, staring into the distance rather than looking at Jim, who was sitting across from him in a chair, "we did these memorial services. Talking about the life of the one we lost. Saying goodbye." He swallowed. "My sister never got one, because everyone had left and I couldn't face doing it on my own. But I'm not really alone now. You and Mycroft are still here. So I feel… I feel we should do that for…" He bit his lip hard and his voice broke. "For Sherlock."

Jim shot him a brief glare, then looked down at the table. "What's the point?" he muttered. "He's gone. And besides… He already said goodbye. To you."

"Mycroft, what do you think?" John asked. "He was your brother…"

"You can do it if you want," Mycroft answered flatly. "If it helps you."

John sighed. "What are we going to do? What's the point of anything now that Sherlock is gone?"

"Well, there is no point in turning around to Pentonville now," Mycroft answered. "We don't even have a body to present them with. And without the assumed offender on the ship… We are clear to return to Earth."

John stared at the face, looking aghast. "How can you be so casual about it? He was your brother, for Victor's sake! He was my master, my _friend_ , and you make it sound like a good thing that he's _dead_? I don't want your bloody Earth! It's no home to me! Not without him!"

"John, calm down," Mycroft said.

"CALM DOWN?" John bellowed. "This isn't okay, Mycroft. You should have kept him safe. You should have protected him. Found a way to get him a pardon, like a proper big brother. What am I supposed to do on _Earth_?"

"Move on," Mycroft answered. "Meet other dogs. Get a job. Live."

"Fuck you!" John strode out and slammed the door behind him.


	4. Justice

Jim was watching the screen intently while dictating a string of numbers at a steady but manageable speed while John was typing, using most of his fingers.

"Did you get it all?" Jim asked, turning to check the readouts on another terminal.

John quickly scanned the numbers and then nodded. "I think so."

"Good." Jim walked over to settle by the console. "If nothing goes wrong, we can continue on this heading for at least another three days before we need to adjust again."

"Good," John agreed. "I'll be in the cabin if you need me."

Jim nodded and did a sort of wave in John's direction, closing his eyes.

"Wait," Mycroft said as John turned towards the door. "I just received a call and I think you should both be there to answer it. It's D.I.C. Lestrade."

"Oh." John swallowed and his left hand tensed up as he turned back. "What does he want?"

"He will tell you himself," Mycroft answered, and made way for Lestrade's image.

"Professor Moriarty. John," Lestrade greeted them. "I just wanted you to know… Sherlock's name has been cleared."

Jim straightened up in his chair. "What?" he demanded. "How? I mean… You seemed pretty certain when you were accusing him of mass murder two months ago… And now you are telling us that you missed something?"

"New evidence has surfaced," Lestrade answered. "Evidence that cast a new light on the whole case."

"But…" John said, looking distressed. "Why were you even still looking into it now that Sherlock's gone?"

"We received an anonymous tip," the captain admitted. "They told us to have a look at the footage from lab 207 in the months between Sherlock's conviction and the disaster. Footage that had somehow been overlooked during the original investigation."

"Are we recording this?" Jim asked, looking up at Mycroft's head in the corner of the screen. "I mean, if we are going to sue them for incompetence, we pretty much have a confession right here."

"Well," Lestrade said, "it _was_ hidden pretty well…"

"You mean, on purpose?" John said.

"Yes," Lestrade answered. "We can only assume that it was intentional. Have a look for yourself."

The screen went dark and then they were looking down on one of the ship's laboratories. "This is lab 207," Lestrade informed them. "The day after Sherlock was placed in stasis."

The camera panned to the left and a dark form came into view. The image went blurry for a second and then, as it zoomed in, revealed the still form of the old dog that had been by Sherlock's side when he had entered the fatal numbers.

"That's Victor!" John said. "But who's filming it?"

"No one," Mycroft answered. "The camera will automatically focus on anything that is recognised as a human or other large lifeform."

For a moment nothing happened on screen. Then Jim appeared, kneeling down by Victor's side, placing a hand on his side.

"Is he dead?" John whispered.

Jim nodded. "He just fell asleep when Sherlock left and never woke up again."

John bit his lip. "Well… He looks pretty old. I'm sure he had a great life with Sherlock."

The Jim on the screen picked up the dog and carried it to one of the tables where he covered it up with a grey cloth.

"You gave him a memorial? That was nice of you," John said, turning towards Jim's hologram. When Jim didn't respond, he returned his attention to the screen.

As Jim left the frame, the image flickered.

"This is 5 hours later," Lestrade informed them. Nothing had changed, but then Jim reappeared, removed the cloth and began arranging a large selection of tools and other equipment on the table.

"I doubt we need to see this particular part," Mycroft remarked.

"Okay," Lestrade said, and the screen went blank.

"What did you do?" John asked Jim.

"I'm a scientist," the hologram said. "And we were working with some dangerous things in that lab. Even though Victor was old, I could not take the risk of just assuming that he had died of natural causes. I had to be sure, so I performed an autopsy."

"That's not all you did," Mycroft pointed out, earning himself a quizzical look from Lestrade.

Now Jim was working at a large machine. For a while he just manipulated the controls and typed in numbers, but then he sat back with a relieved smile and put on gloves, before carefully removing a small glass ball from the side of the machine. The view shifted to a different camera as he carried the ball across the lab and placed it in a sort of cabinet marked 'incubator'.

"I don't understand," John said. "What's he doing? What is that thing?"

"Normally the gestation period for a canine embryo is two months," Lestrade said. "These took almost four. But they weren't regular puppies. Were they, Professor Moriarty?"

Jim didn't answer and John turned to stare at him. "What is he talking about?" A second later, he was distracted by the unmistakable sound of very young puppies crying out in confusion and hunger.

On the screen, Jim was trying to herd the enthusiastic litter into a small pen in the corner of the lab. They all looked like perfect little copies of Victor.

"Aw," John said. "Where did they come from?"

Jim bit his lip and closed his eyes again. "I made them for Sherlock," he muttered. "He loved that dog and though he knew it wouldn't live long enough to see him return, I figured the loss would still hurt him. It would affect his efficiency and if we were ever going to catch up after losing all that time, I would need him at his best. So I cloned his dog, intending to raise one of them and present it to him when he returned."

John gasped. "That's… That's _nice_ of you!"

"I wasn't doing it to be nice," Jim sneered. "I just didn't want Sherlock's focus to be compromised by sentiment."

"Right." John smiled a little.

"So you were just helping out your friend with this?" Lestrade asked. "You had no other motives for creating these dogs?"

"I don't even like dogs!" Jim crossed his arms defiantly. "I'm not soft like Sherlock… was…"

John frowned. "You don't like me?"

Jim didn't even glance at him. "I tolerate you. In the absence of someone better, you have proven moderately useful."

"So you decided to make these particular dogs more useful than any dog ever before," Lestrade said.

Jim, who had been about to retort, closed his mouth as the view on the screen shifted again. The puppies were larger now. 8 to 10 weeks old. A group of them were chasing each other around the lab, but two of them were sitting still, one of them on a tall stool, the other on the counter, where Jim was working with several samples.

As he held out a hand, the puppy patted across the counter, picked up a pipette and put it carefully into Jim's hand. Absentmindedly, Jim stroked its head once before focusing on his work.

The one on the stool turned its head, looking through the room and then let out a soft yip. Instantly all the puppies rushed under the counter, vanishing from sight, and a moment later Anderson walked into the frame.

The video skipped forward, judging by the size of the puppies. Two of them were sitting on the floor, looking at an open book, a couple were asleep and one of them was sitting on the counter again, facing Jim, a chess board between them.

When the small dog gently moved one of the pieces with its paw, cornering Jim's king, John frowned. "Uhm… Didn't you say that normal dogs are just primitive animals?"

"They are," Lestrade answered. "But it is quite clear that these aren't ordinary dogs."

"But you said it took ages to evolve!" John gave Mycroft an accusatory look. "This doesn't make sense!"

"Isn't it obvious?" Mycroft said, nodding towards Jim.

John blinked and slowly turned his head towards the hologram too. "You… _You_ are Sheriarty? You used your godly powers to make the dogs clever like yourself?"

Jim was still looking up at the screen. "There was nothing godly about it," he muttered. "It was quite basic, really. The most astounding thing is, actually, that no one had done it before me."

"Is it really so astounding that everyone else followed the law against humanimal breeding?" Mycroft asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes," Jim said, looking at John now. "In fact, I know I'm not the only one. Remember Mary?"

"I do," John sighed.

"But you were the only one in this universe," Mycroft pointed out. "Professor Donlevy was your parallel in another reality. She, too, must have been the only one to break that particular law at that particular moment."

"Are you seriously telling me that no one has attempted this back on Earth? Not a single person in three thousand years?"

Lestrade cleared his throat. "Does it matter now? There is still more that you need to see."

For the first time, Jim seemed concerned and he did not look at the screen as the image changed again. This time it was a more recent situation, judging from the H on Jim's forehead as he entered the lab. "Computer!" he called out. "Access surveillance, sector NW1." When the computer responded, he ordered it to turn off all cameras, microphones and sensors in the entire area. But instead of summoning the selection of suits John and Sherlock had found him with, he went to one of the terminals and began rattling off rapid commands.

"What are you doing?" John asked, his eyes wide.

"He is altering the footage D.I.C. Lestrade received about an hour later," Mycroft said. "It wasn't easy to do this through voice command, but in the end he managed to change the numbers on the screen. The '0.92' became a '9.2'."

"You… you framed Sherlock?" John whispered, gawking at Jim in shock.

"No!" the hologram protested, his eyes flickering as he held up his hands and backed away from John. "I wouldn't. I just… I needed time…"

"Time!" John snapped. "If we didn't have to turn around to that bloody prison, Sherlock wouldn't have had to go out to fix the sensors! He'd still have been alive! You stole all of his time, and for what? He was innocent!"

He pounced at Jim, teeth gleaming as he opened his mouth, ready to bite. But of course he fell right through the hologram - and then Jim disappeared and John started coughing. Finally he gulped and looked around in confusion.

"I… What… Where did he go?"

"Down your oesophagus," Sherlock said, walking through the door to the bridge. "Or at least his light bee did. Jim, I believe, has been turned off."

John turned around and stared at him. "Sh…" he said, but he didn't manage any more. He just stood there, his mouth slightly open, until finally his upper lip twitched. He bared his teeth and bent his knees a little, clearly preparing for another pounce.

Sherlock took a step back. "J… John…?"

"Sherlock," John breathed, and he leapt at Sherlock, knocking him over onto his back.

Eyes wide with panic, Sherlock squirmed, trying to get out from under the dog. "Calm down, John!" he gasped. "I… I can explain…"

"You're back!" John called out, wrapping his arms tightly around Sherlock's neck. "You really are back!" He pressed his nose flat against Sherlock's cheek, sniffing eagerly. "It really is you." And then he stuck out his tongue and licked Sherlock's cheekbone.

Sherlock stopped resisting and then, laughing, wrapped his arms around John too. "Yes, it's me. I was never really gone."

John frowned and pulled back a little. "What do you mean? You were…" He cast his eyes down. "You really were gone. For months! I don't understand…"

"I was a few levels down," Sherlock explained. "Mycroft was keeping me off the scanners so Jim wouldn't find me."

"You were…" John's eyes widened. "But… I should have smelled you! I could have visited!"

"I was worried you might give it away. Y'know… Let the cat out of the bag."

"Cat…?" John stared at him some more. "Are you telling me that Mary is here too? But why would you put her in a bag?"

Sherlock laughed even harder. "No… It's just an expression. I'm sorry, but Mary is not here. Just me. I hope that's not too disappointing."

For a moment John looked upset, but then he shook his head and hugged Sherlock closer again. "No. I'm very happy to see you."

On the screen, Lestrade was looking just as surprised as John had been a moment ago. "Is… Is that Sherlock?" he asked.

"Yes," Mycroft answered.

"But… How is that possible?"

"There was no meteor shower," Sherlock said, nudging John to move so he could get to his feet. "It was all just a trick on the screen. I re-entered the ship at a lower level and have been working on restoring the log ever since."

"But you… you can't have done that without Mycroft's help…" Lestrade said weakly. "Only a powerful computer could have made those meteors look so realistic."

Mycroft nodded. "I apologise, Gregory. It was impossible for me to tell you the truth. If I had, Professor Moriarty would have found out and then all our work would have been in vain."

"But it's not just that, is it?" Lestrade said. "You knew exactly what you were doing. Making sure that we all thought that Sherlock was dead so you could set course towards Earth."

"Yes," Mycroft replied, "that too was an advantage of this plan."

"I almost wish there was a charge against bloody lying computers," Lestrade said, looking more upset than angry. "I thought we'd built up some trust."

"We had," Mycroft said quietly. "But I really saw no other way to set this right. Sherlock's record of drug abuse was known to your team, so Moriarty's forgery was easy to believe."

"Drug abuse?" John asked, wrinkling his nose.

"In what should have been his last year of university, Sherlock was convicted for the use of memory enhancing drugs," Mycroft explained. "It had been proven that other students in his class had indeed been using them for their exams, yet Sherlock's marks were still better than theirs. Combined with his usual behaviour, this led his teachers to the conclusion that he must be their supplier. If it hadn't been for my connections, my brother would never have made it into space with a past like that. Even so, Captain Carmichael always kept a close watch on him."

"But wouldn't memory enhancing drugs have made it less likely that he forgot to check those numbers on the virus's containment… thingy?" John asked.

"Perhaps," Mycroft said, "but there are some side effects when the drug is wearing off. Users often experience confusion and forgetfulness a few hours after taking a dose."

"Right," John said. "But I still don't get why Jim would be so mean as to frame Sherlock. I mean… Weren't they supposed to be friends? Sort of?"

"We were never friends," Sherlock said. "Though Jim liked to pretend that we were. I worked with him because he was the best there was. But he was also devious and pathologically selfish. That's why he did this. To make sure nobody found out what really happened. Who actually caused the outbreak."

"Gregory," Mycroft said, "would you please play the last relevant clip from the log for us?"

Lestrade nodded and the screen changed again.

The puppies were alone in the lab. Two of them were playing chess, a couple of them sleeping and a few chasing each other over and under furniture. The one that seemed to spend most of its time on the counter was trying to operate Jim's microscope. One of its siblings jumped up on the stool and then onto the counter, bouncing into it with a happy bark. Losing its balance, the other puppy slid across the smooth surface and, just before falling over the edge, managed to catch itself on a protruding panel. Its small paws scratched at the buttons as it tried to right itself. Suddenly an alarm sounded and a red light began flashing on a nearby container. All the puppies began yapping and scrambling to get up on the counter.

"It was the puppy who turned up the heat," Sherlock explained. "Once it realised its mistake, it tried to correct it. The rest of the litter tried to help, but it was too late."

On the screen, Jim appeared, staggering towards the frantic puppies who were all prodding the panel and biting the buttons. But before he could reach them, he collapsed to the floor.

He rolled onto his back, twitching in what must have been intense agony and gasped out: "I… owe… you…"

Two of the puppies jumped down and nudged him with their noses, but he had stopped moving. The image froze.

"That's as far as I'll show you," Lestrade said. "The dogs' clean-up system is efficient, but… well. Unpleasant to watch."

"What did he mean?" John asked, frowning. "Those are strange last words, aren't they?"

"I have no idea," Sherlock said. "Maybe he was blaming somebody for what happened. Not the puppies, but…" He shook his head slowly, brow furrowed in thought.

"If John had not acted so rashly," Mycroft said disapprovingly, "we could have asked him."

"We still can," Sherlock said, smirking. "We just have to wait."

"For what?" John asked, looking puzzled.

"Your digestive system…"

…

"Did you wash it?" Sherlock asked, eyeing the small object in John's hand suspiciously.

John rolled his eyes. "Of course. What kind of doctor do you think I am?" He held the light bee up to his nose and sniffed it. "See, completely fine."

Sherlock took it with the tips of two fingers, placed it on a chair and pushed a button at one end. There was a buzzing sound and then Jim flickered into being, sitting on the chair looking absolutely horrified.

Sherlock just laughed. "Please, Jim…" he said. "Next time you need to see me, you don't have to go through John."

Jim didn't seem to hear him. He just stared at Sherlock. "You… You're alive… But that's impossi…" He stopped mid-word, his mouth slowing down and then just remaining slightly open. He seemed completely frozen except for his eyes, which were sort of flickering.

"Jim?" Sherlock asked, raising a hand and waving it slowly in front of his face. "Oh… I think we broke him," he said, looking a bit uncertain.

"Professor Moriarty has encountered an error and needs to reboot," Mycroft stated. "One moment."

For a few seconds, Jim disappeared, but then he was back in the chair in the same position as before.

He moved his mouth silently for a moment, then managed to croak: "How?"

"We'll get to that," Sherlock said, sitting down in the chair opposite Jim's and looking at him intently. "First you're going to tell us what you meant."

"Meant by what?" Jim asked, glancing back and forth between Sherlock and John.

"Your last words," Sherlock said. "'I owe you'? Whom did you owe and why?"

Jim stared at him, then snorted mirthlessly. "Not 'I owe you'," he said. "The letters. I.O.U. Immune Oppressor Units."

It was Sherlock's turn to stare. "Oh…" he gasped. "Reichenbach! You figured it out. The virus itself can never have caused massive cell death so quickly, so it must trigger an immediate and aggressive immune response. Once the infection takes place, it's too late to do anything to cure it, because the patient will be dead before the cure even reaches the virus. And we can't suppress the entire population's immune systems just in case they ever come into contact with the virus, because that would undermine their defences against every other germ. But the I.O.U.s…"

Jim nodded. "The Reichenbach virus was a sneaky enemy. Turning the body against itself and then just letting the immune system wage war on the healthy cells. That's what made vaccination so impossible. But the I.O.U.s could halt this specific immune response."

"The patient could easily be cured in the time that would buy us. We always knew how to kill the virus," Sherlock said, his eyes shining eagerly now. "The I.O.U.s were fairly recent, but it wouldn't take long to program them against the Reichenbach infection's effects. It's definitely easier than creating a vaccine against something so changeable, and in this case would be much more effective."

"So you solved it!" John cried out happily.

Mycroft nodded slowly. "They did, but… I'm afraid it's too late. The people of Reichenbach went extinct 2726 years ago."

"All because of those damn puppies…" Jim hissed. "If they hadn't tampered with the machine, I could have reported my findings. I could have saved them all. Become a hero…"

John huffed. "You can't blame the puppies for what happened. They were only babies. Of course they'd be playing in the one place they were allowed to go. Keeping the virus safe was your responsibility."

"Besides," Sherlock added, "from what I could see, you would never have solved it without them." He smiled at John. "Seemed your ancestors were proper geniuses. Even at such a young age."

"Don't sound so surprised," John said, smiling back. "You know I'm pretty damn smart."

Lestrade cleared his throat. "Professor Jim Moriarty, I'm arresting you for reckless conduct leading to the death of the crew of the research ship Red Beard, with additional charges for obstruction of justice and violation of the law against humanimal breeding. Given the circumstances, you will be offered a choice on your return back to Earth. Serving 169 consecutive sentences of 5 to 10 years in holoprison, or…" He paused and looked over at Mycroft. "... being permanently deleted."

…

A large, blond, uniformed hologram was marching down a corridor lined with flickering bars, twiddling the light bee between his fingers as he went. When he entered an empty cell, he didn't put it down like Sherlock had done, but rather flicked the switch and then tossed it across the room. With an indignant squeak, Jim crashed into the holobunk and collapsed to the floor.

The guard walked slowly over to him, his wide grin making the scar on his cheek twitch. "Well, hello there," he said, picking Jim up by his collar. "Aren't you a pretty little thing? I'm sure we're going to get to know each other really well…"

Jim looked up at him, looking terrified. But then the guard winked, his grin softening a little. Jim frowned and then relaxed. "You know…" he said, a smile spreading across his face. "I think we just might… Colonel... I've certainly never been turned on like that before."

…

"So, Sherlock, most of my capacity will indeed go to my new minor position in the Earth administration, but that does not mean that I won't keep tabs on you," Mycroft said sternly. "I expect you to keep in touch and not to get into too much trouble. I may be a computer, but I do worry about you, brother dear."

"Oh, I'm sure you won't have much time to worry," Sherlock said. "With running the world and getting better acquainted with your boyfriend, I'm sure you'll have your proverbial hands full for quite a while."

Mycroft huffed. "Gregory is merely a useful contact at Newest Scotland Yard. I assure you that he is far too intelligent to attempt having a relationship with an artificial life form like me."

"Don't be silly," John said, looking amused. "It's clear that you two are head over heels about each other. Well, I suppose that should be head over chin in your case, as you don't have any heels."

Sherlock laughed and patted John's shoulder. "How about we leave them to it?" he said, winking. "I think it's time I introduced you to an interesting human creation called a vindaloo…"

Mycroft watched as the two of them walked off the ship and then said: "Gregory?"

"Yes, Mycroft?" The man's face appeared on the screen next to him.

"Could you please upgrade their surveillance status? Grade Three Active."

Lestrade frowned. "Sorry, whose status?"

The corners of Mycroft's mouth twitched. "Sherlock Holmes and John the Dog."


End file.
